All posts by newsandnoise

Fazil Say got sentenced for insulting Islam in a tweet

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This morning the Turkish pianist, composer and writer, Fazil Say, got sentenced by a Turkish court to imprisonment of ten months suspended for insulting the Islam in a tweet.

The tweet has been sent April last year with a verse from the Persian poet Omar Khayyam from the eleventh century, that questioned whether heaven was a tavern or a brothel, because of the promises that wine will flow and each believer will be greeted by virgins.

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Will “Ding Dong! The Witch is Dead” be censored?

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The song Ding Dong! The Witch is Dead from the movie The Wizard of Oz (1939) sung by the Munchkins, is propelled to the top of the charts in the wake of former PM Margaret Thatcher’s death. There has been a campaign of Facebook that already started six years ago, to ‘make this song number 1 in the week Thatcher dies’. It kind of worked, but will the BBC play the song in the coverage of the Top 40 charts or not.

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Politics meets Gangsta Rap

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Last Saturday Ronnie Brunswijk a.k.a. Romeo Bravo announced that he wants to run for president during the 2015 elections in Suriname (in northern South America). The politician is a coalition partner of Dési Bouterse, the current president. In the 1980s they had quite a different relationship. Brunswijk used to be his bodyguard, but soon led the rebels against Bouterses military regime during the Bush War (1986 – 1992).

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“I can understand the boycott on Israel, but you have to play fair” – an interview with Dubi Lenz

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Marseille – At Babel Med Music, held in March 2013, News & Noise spoke with Dubi Lenz, broadcaster, artistic director of the Red Sea Jazz Festival, and man of many other virtues. Lenz would rather not politicize music, but as the pressure on artists who want to play in Israel is increasing, there is no way to keep out of the discussion. Instead, he prefers to think of building bridges and tries to show that music can be a peacemaker. How does Lenz deal with artists who hesitate to come to Israel and is it possible for Israeli artists to perform in Muslim countries. The interview reflects some interesting thoughts and new insights.

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“We tend to forget that censorship is around us” – an interview with Ole Reitov

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Ole Reitov is the program manager of Freemuse, the World Forum on Music & Censorship. Freemuse, founded in 2000 in Denmark, acts as an information and monitoring platform. They have put in place a number of strategies in order to alert the media, politicians and the people at large of the abuses of censorship (Babel Med guide).  Journalist Jaïr Tchong had an interview with Reitov during Babel Med Music conference in Marseille, March 2013.

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